Byzantine-style chapel planned for Broadland town

An Orthodox church, set up in a shed some twenty years ago, and which moved into a disused police station last year, is now planning to expand into an adjacent Byzantine-style chapel. Tony Rothe reports.

Father Stephen Weston set up St Fursey’s, an English Orthodox Christian church, in a shed in his Sutton garden back in 1998. The tiny chapel was home to a wedding in September 2016 and a visit by His eminence Metropolitan Silouan, bishop of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian archdiocese of the British Isles and Ireland a few weeks later.

Faced with a growing congregation, Father Weston moved the church into a disused police station in Rivermead in nearby Stalham at the end of 2018, and enjoyed a further visit from Bishop Silouan, who is based in London, with a special Eucharist service to bless the building on Sunday February 10.

He now intends to build a domed chapel with a blue roof next to his existing building. Plans have been approved by North Norfolk District Council, and construction work is planned to start this summer. The plans show an octagonal tower, which will allow light into the nave, topped with a golden dome which will house the icon of Christ.

“We are an English Orthodox Christian Church. I want to bring the original Christian faith back to this part of Norfolk” Father Weston told Network Norfolk. “The building will be Byzantine style, the design is based on a church from fourth century Roman Britain excavated in Silchester.

“Our congregation is around twenty, but is growing. We are the only Antiochian church in this area, and we expect to continue growing, especially when we get the new chapel.”

Services are held at 10am every Sunday, and on the first Saturday of every month.

To read about the 2016 visit by Bishop Silouan on Network Norfolk, click here.